"Go on out, Jim," he said. Then he folded Pen in his arms. "Rest here, sweet, tired bird," he said in his rich voice. "Rest here, for I love you with all me soul."
Jim's lips quivered. He went out into the night and once more climbed the Elephant's back. For a long time he sat, too exhausted by his emotions to think. With head resting on his arms, he let the night wind sweep across him until little by little his brain cleared and he looked about him. Far and wide, the same wonder of the desert night; the stars, so low, so tender, so inscrutable, the sky so deep, so utterly compassionate; the far black scratch of the river on the silver desert, the distant black lift of the mountains—Pen's eternal hills!
Over the flagpole on the office the flag rippled and floated, sank and rose, dancing like a child in the joy of living. Jim looked at it wistfully. Flag that his forefathers had fashioned from the fabric of their vision, must the vision be forgotten? It was a great vision, fit to cover the yearnings of the world. His grandfather had fought for it at Antietam. His father had lost it and had died, bewildered and hungry of soul. Was he himself to lose it, son of vision seekers?
The Elephant beneath him seemed to listen for Jim's reply. "God knows," he said at last, "I would not deny the vision to all the immigrant world. All I wish is that we who made the vision had kept it and had taught it to these others to whom our heritage must go. You can scoff, old Elephant, but the struggle is worth while. You can say that nothing matters but Time. I tell you that eternity is made up of soul fights like mine and Pen's!"
Suddenly there came to him the fragment that Pen had quoted to him days before:
"What though the field be lost?
All is not lost—the unconquerable will,
And courage never to submit nor yield;
And what is else, not to be overcome!"
Jim suddenly rose with his blood quickened. "Not to be overcome! And God, what stakes to fight for! To build my father's dream in stone and to make a valley empire out of the tragedy of a woman's soul!"
With renewed strength Jim went down the trail, crossed the canyon and went up to his house.